1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and a method, for managing printed book publishing, in which data of book contents are loaded down from a server and printing and bookbinding for them are performed in a terminal side through an internet, according to a user's request from a terminal.
2. Description of Related Art
At present, there is a desire for providing published materials to users by loading digital data for a book or the like down from a server which is connected to an internet and thereafter by printing, as a form of electronic publication. On the contrary, there is also a tendency to suppress provision of digital data for published materials which may be expected to have an income of royalty for copyright because the providers for such digital data are concerned about the possibility of unlimited illegal copying.
Here, digital data for a book or the like include various types of writings, e.g., literary works, scientific essays, dictionaries, magazines, photographs, paintings and the like. Further, digital data also include data of a publication whose main elements are not writings, e.g., a collection of photographs, a book of paintings, an atlas and the like.
Japanese Patent Publication (Laid-Open) No. Tokukai-hei 7-239828 which corresponds to U.S. Pat. No. 5,509,074 discloses a technique comprising the steps of: creating encoded documents by using a document server, the encoded documents being able to be decrypted only by users which were authenticated with a copyright server; forwarding the documents to corresponding printing agents of each authenticated request user through a network; and decrypting the documents at each of the agents to print them.
The publication says that the technique can prevent illicit copying of electronically published documents.
Japanese Patent Publication (Laid-Open) No. Tokukai-hei 6-103286 which corresponds to U.S. Pat. No. 5,532,920 discloses a technique in which if a user enters a command to transmit a copy of a book over a modem, the royalty payment program intercepts the copying command and suspends the copying operations, and the royalty payment program presents the user with a display of the royalty payment information stored in the book text or in a file accompanying the book.
The publication says that according to the technique, authors and publishers of softcopy books can protect the copyright for the document simply and securely, by providing a means to enforce the payment of royalties to publishers and authors of softcopy books, when a reader desires to make a copy of a portion or all of the book.
In conventional billing (account) processes for printing in electronic publication, a billing system in which charges for printing are accumulated every success page and the amount according to the accumulated results is billed, has been adopted.
The above-described techniques of the references may enable inhibiting unlimited copying and obtaining royalty. However, these techniques do not take into consideration the possibility of performing collection of royalty at all in the case that the user can obtain digital data for desired electronic publication at the terminal which is operated by the user but cannot obtain the objective publication. Therefore, these references disclose no techniques to solve the problem.
The techniques do not take into consideration the possibility of increasing the process load of each component when digital data are sent and received without regard for the performance of terminals and servers, or the traffic of network.